Date: Fri, 19 Jan 1996 17:57:21 -0800
From: Ron Buckmire
Date: Tue, 9 Jan 1996 16:20:41 +0000
It seems there was a problem with my recent posting. I reproduce it
here - forgive duplication if already seen.
Brian
The Scotsman Sat 6 Jan 96
Landmark verdict on lesbian killing.
A lesbian was jailed for eight years yesterday for killing a man who
was said to have been sleeping with her girlfriend.
The High Court in Glasgow heard that Vicki McKean, 28, stabbed
Stephen Blackwell, 40, from London, minutes after being told he had a
realtionship with Connie Andrew, 27.
McKean lunged at Mr Blackwell as he sat on her settee and stabbed him
11 times, the court heard.
One wound sliced through his rib, a lung and went though his heart.
During her three-day trial, McKean made British legal history by
becoming the first lesbian to be allowed to contest a murder
charge with a defence that she killed while acting under provocation.
Normally such a defence is only open in cases where a man has found
his wife in the act of adultery and kills her lover on the spot.
The jury of eight women and seven men, however, accepted the defence
as a valid one in a lesbian relationship, and found McKean not guilty
of murder, but guilty of the lesser crime of culpable homicide.
Sentencing her, Lord MacLean said: "The jury has obviously considered
with care all the evidence in this case and have taken a merciful
view of your position.
"It is nevertheless a very serious crime even though I have to accept
the jury's verdict that you acted under provocation. You took a life
by means of a weapon, and it would appear an innocent life as well."
During the trial the court heard of the long-standing relationship
between McKean and Miss Andrew, childhood friends who became lovers
and started living together four years ago.
On 30 June last year, while they were on holiday in Benidorm, they
went through a form of marriage ceremony. McKean told the court she
considered Miss Andrew to be her wife.
Hugh Matherws, QC, who conducted the defence, said after the sentence
was issued: "This case is a legal milestone. Our researches went
back to the very first case of provocation in 1731, when a man found
his wife and lover in bed and killed him with a sword. All
subsequent cases have involved heterosexual relationships and this is
the first one in Britain to invlove a homosexual relationship."